Couple an OLPC with an iRobot Create to create a telepresence robot. Using a simple web interface, users can drive the Create, monitor its sensor readings, and explore the world across the internet through the attached OLPC's webcam and microphone.

While a commenter on Instructables went the high-brow route and wonders if Damon can swarm XO computers over a mesh network, or at least build cheap hazardous waste monitors, I'm going to use Damon's "beer condition" concept and go multi-brow.

North American geeks will snap up OLPC's XO-1 computer by the Gigabyte come November 12 just for uses like Damon's baby/house/keg monitor - community, business, educational uses that no one can predict but everyone will celebrate. In fact, I expect One Experiment Per Laptop to overwhelm the likes of Make or BoingBoing quite quickly, once 25,000 XO computers are in the wild.

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"In fact, I expect One Experiment Per Laptop to overwhelm the likes of Make or BoingBoing quite quickly, once 25,000 XO computers are in the wild."

25,000 is a very small run for a production that was geared towards millions. Why the very small run?

My suspicion is that within OLPC HQ there is a very real and well-founded uncertainty about whether these machines will sell in a large run. They're right to be scared because the Asus EEE is geared for retailing for $100-$200 less with more flash and a faster processor.
Look at the projected run size they have planned.

"ASUS expects to sell about 200,000 units in 2007, 300,000 to 500,000 by March 2008 and 3â€“5 million by 2009."

The small OLPC run is to avoid the embarrassment of having machines left on the shelf, because that would kill OLPC dead and they're betting that the US has at least 25,000 geeks. They're probably right but so what?

The X0-IRobot telepresence hack is really cool. The thing about the XO is both the software and the hardware are open and so hacks are easy to do. That is in contrast to proprietary machines like the Classmate and the Asus EEE. They are designed to do what the manufacturer wants and nothing else.

This is a birthday present for me (the laptop). I am writing this while using build 613, browser. Linux PCLinuxos 2007 as base os, Virtual Box 1.5 is running the build. I have been testing the Sugar OS for weeks now. And love the way it is coming together.

IMO 25k units will sell out very quickly. I'm sure there are already "investment groups" looking at buying and flipping as many units as possible for as much as possible. Hopefully if they sell out quickly "the powers that be" will announce a second public batch to deflate the secondary market prices.

Between the XO's perceived collectiblity and it's usefulness as a rugged machine I suspect the open market price to be $600-$800 but could have a beginning "freak" price spike.